This is a story from 1981 when my father was flying the Sikorsky 58 Helicopter for Court Helicopters in Cape Town which mainly was used to replenish ships sailing round the Cape of Good Hope. This was in all weather and anytime, day or night.
This is his story about how he and the crew nearly lost their live trying to get back to the base at the Cape docks in the middle of the night in bad weather.
“he story is as follows….
“However, in this case, with the radar out of action, I could see we would fly straight into the bank of low cloud at our present rate of descent. So, I suggested we abandon the let-down and make a visual approach by descending early. In this way, we could contact the sea, as the cloud base was only a few hundred feet above the water. Stan ignored this suggestion and radioed the operations staff at the docks to get a visual weather report. They confirmed they could see Robben Island’s lights and the beacon light at the end of the pier. Somehow this information seemed to convince Stan that if he stayed on the 179 degrees ‘back bearing’ from the Robben Island NDB, he would be able to descend safely through the layer of cloud.
I felt uncomfortable with this decision, but technically, as he was still the actual captain, he had ultimate authority over this flight. As we entered the cloud, he maintained 90 knots, although he should have reduced to 60 knots at 1,500 feet. I brought this to his attention, but once again, he just brushed aside my concerns. I started to worry as we now had no reference to give us an actual distance to the pier. The predicament he had put us in, horrified me. I felt trapped and helpless to avert an impending disaster. Now, completely ‘out of the loop’, Stan remained oblivious to the danger to which he was blindly subjecting us.
At 500 feet, I started to pray for a break in the cloud below us and desperately searched out of the side cockpit window. Suddenly, a gap opened, and I was shocked to find we had overshot the dock area and were in a fast rate of descent over red rooftops on the side of Signal Hill. When I saw the houses, it confirmed my worst fears and gave me such a jolt, that I snatched the controls out of his hands and pulled back hard on the cyclic. As the nose went up, I simultaneously yanked up on the collective lever. By taking this automatic and spontaneous action, I managed to arrest the descent, which saved us from impacting the rising ground. After a few agonising seconds, we popped out through the top of the cloud with Table Mountain straight ahead.
Not saying a word, I turned 180 degrees, and once clear of the line of cloud, I set up a descent to duck beneath the base to make a visual approach and landing onto the helicopter pad. Once safely on the ground, still shaken and angry, I handed the controls back to Stan, while I completed the ‘shut down’ checks. I expected some sort of apology from him for nearly killing us. But although he had sat back meekly throughout the unorthodox way, I had taken over control; I was stunned when his only remark was, “The ops staff were talking rubbish”! “
My father has written many exciting stories in his book below, which you may enjoy. It covers many stories of nears misses and close shaves in the air.
Click here for Sikorsky 58 Helicopter model
Sikorsky 58 (UH-34D) Choctaw
A 1/72 scale diecast model of a French 1964 Sikorsky UH-34D Choctaw.
A piston-engined military helicopter originally designed as an anti-submarine warfare aircraft for the United States Navy.
Includes a free display stand.